Suicide's Aftermath

The Pain Never Goes Away

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Fri, 26 Feb 2016 14:52:00 +0000

I haven't blogged in a really long time, not because I don't miss my brother, or that I feel like I've recovered. Quite the opposite - the more time that passes, the more lifecycle events that occur, the more I feel his absence.

My oldest nephew had his bar mitzvah a few weeks ago. It was a happy, momentous occasion but I couldn't help but wonder how much more wonderful it would have been with Eytan by my side.

As my son, Ronen, grows older I remember Eytan with my older nephews, and what an amazing uncle he was. An uncle Ronen will never know.

The pain never goes away. I wish I had a chance to tell Eytan that before he died. I don't if it would have made a difference, knowing what a hole is was going to leave. He was obviously in a very dark place.

Last weekend I received an email from someone I have never met, who read about me in an article, found my contact info, and told me he was planning his suicide. He just needed to know how to minimize pain to his family before he did it.

After a flurry of phone calls with amazing friends and colleagues, I responded and spoke with him that evening. I told him my honest story, and how the best way for him to minimize pain to his family to be alive for them. He hadn't realized the pain didn't go away - and maybe I saved his life by sharing my story with him.

If there is anyone out there who is struggling and thinks their family will be better of without them - take it from me, you are wrong. I will never recover from the loss of my brother, there will be a hole in my life forever because he is gone. Believe me when I tell you, the pain never goes away.

3 Years

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 29 May 2013 15:48:00 +0000

I hate this time of year.

It will be 3 years in a few weeks.

3 years. It seems impossible that so much time has passed since I lost my brother.

I've been spending a lot of time being angry lately. Angry that my brother could do this to our family. Angry that I didn't know something was wrong. Angry for all the time wasted and time lost with him.

When does it get easier? When do I get to a point where I don't flash back to the call from my dad telling me my brother was dead? That I don't feel myself there, at the funeral, watching his casket lowered into the ground and his friends throwing dirt onto his grave?

I'm so angry at him, at me, at God, that it has to be this way. Why me? Why did I have to lose my brother? Why do all of my friends get to keep and enjoy their siblings and I had to lose mine?

I'm tired of being angry. I'm tired of being sad.

I just want him back.

On Confusion, Anger, & Time

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 04:49:00 +0000

Aside from the anniversary of my brother's death, I think the High Holidays are the hardest time of year for me.

I want so badly to make sense of what happened. I don’t know how I can process things otherwise.

So here's how my making sense of this goes.

I believe that God is at His heart benevolent. In that case, there must be some reason for all of this to happen. Something we did to deserve this. And that guilt is heavy.

But how could we possibly have done something so terrible as to deserve this? I know me, and I know my family. Eytan's death was NOT our fault. We don't have to accept that guilt. We are not to blame.

Then who or what is?

If I believe God or some higher power oversees the world, then God must be the cause in some way, and if He's the cause then He is a malevolent God, even though in my heart I know that's not true.

Or there is no sense to the world, no God, no order, things just happen.

But I believe there IS logic and order to the world. I don't believe things just happen.

So if God is benevolent and I believe there is order in this world, then there must be a reason for this...

I'm caught in this circular argument with myself.

I couldn't bring myself to speak to God over Rosh Hashana (Jewish New Year). I didn't set foot in shul (synagogue). I couldn't. I'm so angry, I don't have anything but anger for Him. I think (hope) He understands.

Everything was so much easier before I understood how fleeting life is. How temporal we all are. Our vulnerabilities, our limits, our mortality. How we don't know what we've got until suddenly it's gone forever and we are left wondering why we wasted so much time. I wasted so much time that I could have spent with Eytan. And now there isn't any time left.

I feel like his death has since passed me by but the wake of his death is still churning and I'm caught in it, just treading water, gasping for air. I can't extricate myself because even though Eytan's death is behind me I'm still so caught up in the aftermath. Just when I think I've moved forward I find myself right back in those churning waters. That place where it hurts as much as it did the day my Dad called me with the news, the day we laid my brother in the ground.

How do you look forward to a new year when you feel stuck in the past, and all you can think about is rewinding time?

On Judgement

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 02:06:00 +0000

According to Jewish tradition, every year God weighs our merits and our transgressions, and our fate for life or death is written on Rosh HaShana and sealed on Yom Kippur.

What does it mean to be judged? What merits and transgressions weigh more heavily than others?

I used to think that living a life where I give more than I take and I try to make the world a better place meant that I was living righteously, and that I would surely be written for life. Now, I just don't know. How do we know if we're living in a way that our merits will outweigh our transgressions?

My brother wasn't perfect, but he was a kind, funny, loving, and wonderful person. He lived life righteously. How could God have sealed his fate for death?

I don't understand. I don't know how to understand.

What I wouldn't give for just one more day with him.

May His Memory Be for a Blessing

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 19:12:00 +0000

Tonight is my brother's yartzheit (Hebrew calendar anniversary of his death). In the Jewish tradition, it is customary to say "may his/her memory be for a blessing" after the death of a loved one. This is especially important to me because I lost my brother to suicide, and I want to believe that something good can come of his death.

Please help my brother's memory be for a blessing by making a donation in his honor.

Make a donation to the Eytan Kaplowitz Memorial Fund
Make a donation to the House of Ruth
Make a donation to American Jewish World Service

Or make a donation to any organization whose mission you believe in.

May we all be comforted amongst the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

Anniversaries

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 23:36:00 +0000

I can't believe it will be two years on June 14th. Two years since I got the most terrible, unimaginable call from my dad. Two years since this huge hole was ripped into my life. Two years of tears and pain and anger. Two years without him.

Sometimes it seems like he's been gone so long, other times it hurts like it just happened yesterday. I feel like there are so many broken pieces of my heart to knit back together, but I'm getting there. I'm no closer to comprehending my brother's suicide, and although I have found a place where I can come to terms with it and move forward with my life, I'll grapple with all of the unanswered questions forever.

I miss you so much, little brother.

Dreams

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 17:55:00 +0000

I had a dream about my brother last night. This certainly isn't the first time, but it has been a while. I didn't remember the dream at first, but it all came back to me in a flash as I stepped out of the shower this morning.

I only remember bits and pieces of the dream. I wish I could remember more. It was so real.

We were walking hand in hand, and I could feel that his hand was dry and chapped.

I remarked he looked haggard and thin, and he laughed it off saying something I can't remember. I wish I could remember.

At some point, looking at him, it crossed my mind that I must be dreaming since he's gone and I can't talk to him anymore, but I pushed the thought aside. I didn't want to let my consciousness overtake these few precious moments, however unreal they were, away from me.

It hurts so much that he's gone. It hurts more to see him in my dreams and then wake up and know he's not here. I wish he were here.

Holes

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 03:04:00 +0000

It's been a busy 5 months. I married the love of my life, started a new job, and I'm happily settling into both. Things are good--great in fact. But as wonderful as things are, there is still a 6 foot, 250 lb gaping hole in my life. And I don't know if anything can ever fill it.

And So Life Went On

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 15:36:00 +0000

Wow, it's been a long time since I've written here. It's not because I haven't been thinking about my brother--he's been on my mind a lot.

I got married last month. For some reason, this felt like much more of a milestone in my recovery from my brother's suicide than the anniversary of his death. I didn't feel like anything changed at the anniversary, but after the wedding, I felt like I had graduated to a new level.

It was hard that he wasn't at the wedding, but we invited him to join us (and my husband's father, who also died of suicide). AK and I learned a tractate of Talmud together in their honor, and celebrated finishing the tractate just before the wedding ceremony. This was an incredibly meaningful part of the wedding for us, and we found out later that it was meaningful to everyone--there weren't many dry eyes in the house.

We also invited my brother's best friend to be one of the witnesses of our marriage, and having him under the chuppah (marriage canopy) with us was really special. It felt like, at least in some small way, my brother was there with us.

I had been terrified in the weeks leading up to the wedding that I would be a total emotional mess. Luckily, my overactive catastrophe-centric brain was way off base. I felt sad a few times, but was able to really whole-heartedly feel joyful and celebrate at the wedding.

My brother will be with me forever, and I'll experience the pain of my loss forever, but I've gotten to that place where I can be happy and live again. I think I've reached the light at the end of the tunnel. And it feels good.

A Double Standard

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 19:20:00 +0000

You may have read about the horrific murder of Leiby Kletzky, an 8 year old child living in an Orthodox Jewish community. His murderer is another member of that same community.

Of course, everyone agrees that his murderer must be mentally ill. Leiby's death came about because of mental illness. Thousands of people showed up to bury Leiby, and thousands more have shown their support for his family by writing letters and giving tzedakah (charity) in his name.

The murder of an 8 year old boy is nothing less than shocking, traumatic, and horrible. I don't mean at all to minimize this fact by what I am about to say. But hundreds of people in Orthodox Jewish communities die every year of mental illness. By suicide. Why is there such a media circus around this young boy, but still a dark shroud of silence around suicide in the Orthodox Jewish community?

Both the death of Leiby and the death of my brother came about because of mental illness. But the reactions are polar opposites. People who have never even met Leiby are writing letters in his memory and to his family. Someone set up a gmail account where you can email letters of comfort to the family. Why can't the extended Orthodox Jewish community rally support around families who have lost loved ones to suicide in the same way they have for Leiby's family?

Yahrtzeit & Unveiling

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 15:22:00 +0000

This past weekend, I attended the wedding of my fiance's cousin. It was a beautiful wedding, but afterward it made me incredibly sad that my brother will be glaringly absent from mine.

Sunday night began my brother's yahrtzeit (Hebrew anniversary of death). I went to shul (synagogue) to say the Mourner's Kaddish, a special prayer recited in memoriam of a loved one who has died. It was harder than I thought. We drove up to my parents' house and lit a memorial candle.

A tradition has developed among American Jews to officially "unveil" a headstone. We held the unveiling for my brother's headstone yesterday. Baninu v'achinu ha'yakar. Our precious son and brother. That's what his headstone says. It felt so surreal to be sitting there reading my brother's name on a block of marble. A few of my brothers close friends attended, and his best friend said a few beautiful and heartfelt words about what he missed most about my brother being here with us.

I spent the weekend thinking about time, and how I didn't get enough of it with my brother. How much time we all waste on stupid little things, instead of on the important things, and that you never know how precious time is until it's gone.

I miss him so much.

No Words

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 13:01:00 +0000

Today I woke up feeling like crying. I'm not really sure what it is about the rain, but some days it makes me terribly sad.

A friend reached out to me last week to ask if I would speak to a friend of their's who just lost her brother to suicide. I emailed the person, but after a year I still struggle to find the words that will bring me comfort. Because there are no words.

Nothing can bring back a loved one lost to suicide, and there are truly no words of comfort to offer (at least, none that I have found). Not "it gets better" or "it gets easier" or "you're so strong" or "I'm sure he knew you loved him" or any of the things people think will be comforting but are not. Words can't heal the little hole inside you. I don't know what can.

1 Year

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 12:16:00 +0000

Today is the anniversary of my brother's death.

Sometimes it feels like it happened so long ago, sometimes like it happened yesterday.

I can still remember exactly where I was standing when I got the call from my dad. Feel my heart trying to beat out of my chest, the blood rushing like a windstorm in my ears, the disbelief, the terror, the sadness, the pain.

The details of that day are carved into my soul. I still miss him every day.

I don't think losing someone you love gets easier. You just learn how to cope with it better. You learn to live with the little hole in your heart; it may get smaller over time, but it never goes away. And that's okay. It helps to remind me to be thankful every day for the good things in my life, and to tell those close to me that I love them.

Thank you to all of the wonderful friends who have helped me and supported me through a pretty hellish year. You're a good part of the reason I'm doing okay.

This Is Why I Share My Story

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 18 May 2011 18:16:00 +0000

Yesterday, a friend reached out to me because they worried their sibling may be suicidal. This friend felt comfortable reaching out to me because I've been blogging and sharing my experience about recovering from my own brother's suicide. I don't know if I offered much, but I hope I offered something.

Last night was the first time I felt like my brother's death was not meaningless. It remains a terrible tragedy, and one that will forever affect me, but if my brother had to die, at least I can use the experience to help someone else.

This is why I share my story.

Fighting with Mental Illness

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:56:00 +0000

I've been thinking a lot about what kind of desperation would make someone even contemplate suicide. Someone in AK's community back home committed suicide this week.

Have you ever listened to Good Charlotte? Kind of a grungy/rocky style, I discovered them in high school. They have a song called "Hold On," which if you watch the music video is about suicide. I sometimes find myself playing the lyrics in my head and trying to understand what my brother went through.

Living with mental illness can be a fight to survive every day. Millions of people in this world struggle with depression, and too many attempt or complete suicide.

My brother had a lot of fight in him. A lot. Was it too much that he just gave up? Had he fought for so long that there was no more fight in him? I wish I knew. I wish I understood more.

I wish he were still here.

When Reason & Logic are Twisted

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 15:33:00 +0000

I had a little bit of a crying jag earlier this week; it had been an incredibly long day at work (13 hours, to be exact), and I was trying to relax by watching CMT (Country Music Television) which was just playing music videos. One came on about servicemen in the military who had been injured in combat. One had lost his leg below the knee, and one had been blinded. Yet in the face of adversity, they figured out how to make it through and thrive again in life.

I burst into tears. How can they find the strength to live and my brother couldn't?

I have to catch myself at this point. I struggle every day to understand what my brother must have felt like, what could have made the world look so black to him. Ironically, it probably was a twisted version of reason and logic that played into my brother's suicide. For someone in the depths of depression, death seems the most logical choice.

I just wish for once he wouldn't have been so logical.

And Life Goes On

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 14:36:00 +0000

Tomorrow will be the seven month anniversary of my brother's suicide.

If there is one thing I have learned since then, it's that however much I miss him, even if I wallow in sadness forever, life just has to go on.

I got engaged just before the new year. It was a wonderful, exciting, happy end to a pretty shitty year. My engagement to a wonderful man has brought back some happiness into our lives, a feeling I thought we'd never find again. It's a different kind of happiness, tinged with the knowledge that my brother won't be at my wedding, but it's still happiness.

A few days after he proposed, AK asked me if I was sad that I couldn't tell my brother about our engagement. I told him the truth--I'm not. I'm sad he won't be at my wedding, my first child's birth, and every other happy event to come. But I'm not sad I can't tell him about my engagement. Because he knows. And life has to go on without him.

Why Rain Makes Me Sad(der)

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 04:24:00 +0000

It poured today.

I've never liked rain. The clouds, the gray dreariness...I miss the sun on days like today.

But rain now holds an even more profound sadness for me. Around this time last year, my brother came to visit me. We had a whole day of monument touring planned, but it was raining so hard neither of us really wanted to go out. Instead, we spent the day on the couch, watching some old favorite movies and laughing at ourselves.

I thought about him a lot today. How he won't ever again grace my couch on a rainy day. How his memory is inexorably tied to the rain, which I imagine (even in the face of global warming) will continue to show its face from now until eternity. What a legacy death leaves behind.

A Glimmer of Understanding

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 15:06:00 +0000

A friend reached out after reading my post where I asked how my brother could not see all those around him who would have done anything to help him. I struggle with that a lot--not being able to step into his shoes to know what he must have been going through. Reading her illustration of the experience of depression, I think I can grasp just a glimmer of understanding. Thank you for sharing this with me.

I’m on a sailboat, all alone, in the middle of the ocean. And I don’t know how to sail. I drift.

Sometimes the seas are calm, and I go about my days doing the things I need to. I might even see another sailboat nearby, and if the person on that boat sails over to me, I don’t have to be alone. (Remember, I don’t know how to sail, so I can’t sail to the other person’s boat.)

Sometimes when the seas are calm, I even think that I can sail. It doesn’t end well.

And when the seas are rough, it takes all I have not to fall overboard, not to be completely debilitated by seasickness. It would take an expert sailor to reach me. And it wouldn’t matter. The seas would still be rough.

Sometimes, it would be easier to drown.

Justifiable Suicide?

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 14:03:00 +0000

I read an article in the NYTimes about suicide and suicide attempts by women in Afghanistan. By fire.

Cooking oil and matches are readily available. Girls are all but sold to much older husbands who rape them, beat them, and shame them. Their families--if they are still allowed to see them--can offer no protection. These women and girls have nowhere to turn. So they choose suicide by fire.

One woman's husband taunted her that she did not have the strength to burn herself. Unfortunately, she did.

I don't know that suicide is ever justifiable or warranted, but I think I can understand, maybe a little, what would make one of these woman choose such an escape.

What depth of pain must my brother have been in? He had a family that loved him, friends who cared about him, and so many people who would have moved heaven and earth to help him. How could he have seen suicide as the only way out?

Walking in My Brother's Honor

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 18:30:00 +0000

This past Saturday, AK and I participated in the Out of the Darkness Community Walk to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. We joined about 400 others who were walking in memory of a loved one lost to suicide. With the support of so many friends, AK and I hit our fundraising goal of $2,500--in less than 2 weeks.

The walk wasn't as monumental as I thought it might be. I spent a good portion of the time being angry and upset that I was even participating in the walk, and that so many people have been affected by suicide. They gave out colored necklaces--honor beads--to symbolize the loved one lost to suicide. Orange for siblings, gold for parents, white for children, red for spouses, purple for friends. It was heartbreaking to see so many people wearing multiple beads.

They had run out of purple beads before we even got there.

Someone Who Can Relate

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 19:13:00 +0000

Although my friends and community have been incredibly supportive, pretty much nobody really knows what I'm going through. Don't get me wrong, I never want anyone to be in a place to understand, but at the same time, it's hard that people can't say more than "Wow, I'm so sorry, I have no idea what you are going through."

I started going to a suicide support group. I don't think I knew how much I needed to talk to someone who could say "Wow, I've been there, I'm so sorry."

My first group, I met a woman who was attending her last. She lost a son to suicide 3 years ago. As she left, she offered some words of wisdom: One day--maybe near, maybe far from now--we'll learn to be happy again. It won't be the same happy as it was before, but it will return. And although the pain never fully goes away, life can be sweet again.

I hope to be her one day.

Stolen Moments

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 15:40:00 +0000

This past weekend, I attended the wedding of one of my best friends from college. The bride, who has also become a good friend, lost her mother a number of years ago.

During the wedding ceremony, the rabbi mentioned her mother, and how he knows she is looking down and celebrating with her daughter even though she isn't physically there.

It didn't make me very upset at the time, but thinking about it later, it set me off on a crying jag.

There are so many future moments in life in which I had envisioned my brother as an integral part. But he won't walk down the aisle at my wedding. And although I know he'll be there with me in spirit, it's just one of a million moments that have been stolen from me.

Bad, Bad Dreams

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 18:58:00 +0000

I don't usually dream, or at least I seldom remember any dreams if I have them; even when I do remember, I'm not usually one for bad dreams, although I have the occasional nightmare.

Lately, I've been having a lot of really bad dreams, most of which involve losing someone I love in one way or another.

Ever since I lost my brother, I carry around an intense fear of losing someone else I love. I worry about it a lot, and I suppose that's carried over into my subconscious. I can't decide which is better--not being able to sleep, or having fitful and restless sleep full of nightmares.

Kind of damned if I do, and damned if I don't. I wish this was getting easier and not harder.

We Should Think Before We Speak

noreply@blogger.com (RK) — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 18:18:00 +0000

Since my brother's death, I have become significantly more attuned to the way I, and others, speak.

For example, have you ever thought about the number of times we reference death and suicide on any given day?

"Man, that test was a killer."
"Working with her makes me want to kill myself."
"Another assignment? Just kill me now..."
"This project is going to kill me."

I cringe a little every time someone uses a turn of phrase like the ones I listed above. I wonder why we use death and suicide to describe so many things. It's not that I haven't used them in the past, but I'm very careful about my choice of words these days.

How desensitized have we become to the power of our words that we can talk about death and suicide in such a nonchalant manner?